Gareth's Culture and Travel Blog

Like I did with that other Covent Garden rarity – a new opera (Anna Nicole) – I’m making an exception by blogging an even rarer thing – a new full length ballet. I gather it’s c.15 years since the last one and c.20 years since one with a new score. I’m not a fan of mixed bills and I exhausted the repertoire of full evening works some time ago, so a potential treat was in store.

This is more in the Northern Ballet Theatre dance drama mould than classical ballet, which might be the reason why I enjoyed it so much – the latter can be very fusty and fussy. They’ve engaged playwright Nicholas Wright to provide a scenario, which is maybe why the dramatic flow is so good, and Joby Talbot’s score is hugely impressive. Designer Bob Crowley’s imagination has run wild and produced some stunning witty sets and even more stunning costumes. Jon Driscoll (fresh from creating the extraordinary tornado in Kansas which is one of the highlights of The Wizard of Oz) and Gemma Carrington provide brilliant projections. The production values are second to none and only Covent Garden has the resources to stage something this spectacular (If he’s sees this, NBT’s David Nixon will turn green permanently).

Zenaida Yanowsky takes your breath away as the Queen of Hearts. Eric Underwood is astonishingly agile as the Caterpillar, Steven McRae makes a wonderful Mad Hatter and all three leads – Edward Watson’s White Rabbit, Sergei Polunin as the Knave and Lauren Cuthbertson as Alice – dance brilliantly. Then there’s the Duchess…….why they cast an actor rather than a dancer I don’t know, but if you’re going to have an actor for a Panto Dame-like comic part, you won’t get better than Simon Russell Beale. Watching him take ballet bows at the end, he looked completely at home – like a dancer who has moved on to those ‘character’ parts like they do as they age.

With Anna Nicole, The Wizard of Oz and this within a fortnight, I’m in danger of overdosing on colourful spectacle, but I wouldn’t have missed this for the world and there’s so much detail, I’m just going to have to go again when it returns.